


Off Tempo

by Saudadetea



Category: iKON (Korea Band)
Genre: M/M, Some Fluff, Some angst, a cute nervous bobby at the end there, bandfic, smtm era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-10
Updated: 2017-07-10
Packaged: 2018-11-30 03:57:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11455473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saudadetea/pseuds/Saudadetea
Summary: Confessions are hard. Bobby makes them confusing.





	Off Tempo

When Hanbin confessed to Bobby he knew the timing was bad. It had only happened because Bobby had found one of his scribbles of lyrics for some unused song. Then efficiently cornered him, and with that smirk that gets Hanbin's heart beating, asked who it was Hanbin was writing love songs for.  
  
"An existence beyond compare, contradicting on all accounts," Bobby recites out loud, and much to Hanbin's surprise, Bobby isn't looking at the open notebook in his hand when he does. Which means Bobby has it memorized. "Hair as black as the starless night, but a smile as bright as the cloudless day."  
  
Out of all the ways to die, Hanbin never thought it'd be a heart attack at the young age of 19. There's a sinking, sickly feeling in his stomach, one that comes with cold sweats and the inability to move.  
  
He's staring and dry mouthed when Bobby finishes. The boy looking at him expectantly as the question of  _"who is it"_ lingers in the air.  
  
With the limited brain function he has left working for him Hanbin weighs his options. He could lie but Bobby knows him too well. Being best friends gives Bobby that advantage of having a keen sense for understanding Hanbin's  _everything._  
  
So Hanbin is left with really one option. And then he feels how the air has gets sucked out of his lungs, out of the room, out of the universe.  
  
Bobby inches in closer and Hanbin is about to scream  _how do you not realize?!_  but all that comes out in his raspy whispering voice is, "you."  
  
Everything stills. Bobby appears to have stopped moving closer and the silence that follows deafens him. The heart Hanbin swore he lost in the pits of his stomach is suddenly back in place and hurting all too much.  
  
For the first time Hanbin can't tell what the expression on Bobby's face is. He doesn't even want to guess because right now Bobby looks....hurt. Which is weird because Hanbin swears he's the one about to be rejected.  
  
"It's okay," Hanbin ends up saying. "I didn't expect anything to hap—"  
  
"Hanbin." Bobby has grabbed his arm, "I'm sorry."  
  
And that's it. That's where they leave it. Hanbin feeling like broken glass and Bobby searching for something better to say.  
  
The weeks that follow are awkward. Their eyes would meet only to jump away within the same breath. However, despite that, their friendship doesn't weaken.  
  
Hanbin had expected it to though. He had thought they'd drift apart somehow. That eventually the quietness between them, the pain of trying to be casual, normal, would eat away at them. He admits, that he tried to put space between them. Hanbin had re-judged all his habits and was willing to redraw the boundaries. Less touching, no bathroom sharing, closeness only gifted when together with other members. Just those small moments that he'd taken granted before.  
  
_It's only until things are figured out,_  Hanbin would tell himself.  
  
Looking back, Hanbin sees now that he was actually waiting to see if Bobby noticed the changes. Saw the hesitancies, understood the quiet tensions and would cross the little divides Hanbin had conjured. Prove that Hanbin was someone worth chasing. It was a really silly wish on Hanbin’s part to selfishly prove his own self worth.  
  
So it surprises him that Bobby  _ **does**_  close the distance. And does so tenfold.  
  
It's in the smallest touch against his bare skin. A smile in passing. The reshuffling of limbs. Expressions given and lost. Or just the way Bobby's tone dips, softening when he speaks to him. Hanbin gravitates to it like a moth to a flame.  
  
He's sensitive to such things especially now that he knows his feelings are known. It drives Hanbin partially crazy. He was rejected, right? Had he managed to miss something? Or maybe misunderstood?  
  
As those questions pile up so too does stress and training schedules. When they agreed to try for season three of Show Me The Money, neither had suspected that another survival show would meet them around the same time. Certainly, not one as emotionally taxing as this. With three added members and the scare of losing their friends the anxiety over it all keeps Hanbin awake at night.  
  
They went into SMTM with the commitment to show that they were more than just idols, more than their company, more than what the editing team made them appear to be. But as it continued, as Hanbin felt dragged and weakened by his own mistakes, he realizes he was fighting alone.  
  
Hanbin never brings it up, he knows why Bobby shifted gears. A goal closer to the heart is easier to fight for than a reason for one's self.  
  
He’s standing in the studio and suddenly the walls were too close. The ceiling too low. The air too thick and hot. He was at a breaking point, the camera crew moved past him on their way to the practice room and for the sake of gaining a breath, he runs the other way. Breaks out through the sliding doors and across the dew covered grass. He runs until his socks are soaked and his lungs burn.  
  
He makes it to the park and sits in a private roofed seating area. The sticky summer air heats him and forces his thoughts to prioritize themselves. Hanbin collects all that's left of his own dignity and for once is able to shut out the expectations of others and focus  _only_  on what  _he_  wants to say. He knows the words will be his last on the show, that they won't be enough to carry him. But this wasn't his story to finish.  
  
Later, Bobby confirms Hanbin's thoughts as the finals near. They're eating ramen out of a shared bowl when Bobby finally bares it.  
  
"I'm doing this for my Mom," he's intensely serious as he passes Hanbin headphones to listen to his latest track.  
  
"You'll win," Hanbin tells him. And in the briefest second all the butterflies and nervousness comes back to Hanbin when he meets Bobby's eyes, unexpectedly telling and open.  
  
There's more to be said. Hanbin can see the unmade words on Bobby's lips but the boy just smiles, tucking the words away. For some reason Hanbin's cheeks heat up. In the back of his mind he hears the looping sound of Bobby's apology to his confession months ago. The one that broke him then but doesn't now. Had he seen what he sees now Hanbin would have known to ask _"sorry for what?"_.  
  
The final comes and goes and Hanbin was right. Bobby wins. After the money came in, things changed. The effervescent battery Bobby already was impossibly increased. ecstatic smiles, louder laughs. Even the darkest summer nights couldn't diminish that brightness.  
  
An invisible weight had been lifted from the boy and in time Hanbin's heart swelled back up with fluttery stutters and warmth. In the weeks that pass Hanbin puts some of those feelings into better songs and he watches Bobby replace gaming with house hunting and small dumb jokes just for Hanbin.  
  
All that angst that had plagued him lessens and Hanbin believes this could be enough.  
  
When Bobby comes bounding into the kitchen this morning, rattling a new set of keys in Hanbin's face, Hanbin isn’t even unsettled.  
  
"Wanna see the apartment?" Bobby has a smile plastered to his face and Hanbin can't stop his own lip pull reaction to it.  
  
"Okay," he says and Bobby makes that childish laugh and steals a few of Hanbin's apple slices.  
  
What does surprise Hanbin is that he's the only other person Bobby had asked to come along. And as they make the drive in the car Bobby surely begged off of their manager, Hanbin fights to keep down his giddiness. He feels special, important.  
  
The apartment building is quaint in its old brick facade and years worth of potted plants spotting the stairs as they climb up to the fourth floor. On each landing the plants take over the window space, flowers and snake leaves turn toward the passing sun, looking out at the narrow streets below.  
  
The apartment itself is more modern. Hanbin eyes the kitchen stocked with new appliances, the warning stickers still pasted on their windows. There's smooth granite counter tops, white walls and light colored hardwood floors that stretch over the whole of the apartment.  
  
It's spacious and homey and Hanbin leaves himself to imagine it filled with more furniture and people and pictures with memories along the walls and table tops. Bobby would walk in here and his mom would rush to pinch his cheeks there, and they’ll envelop each other in a hug over there while Bobby cutely whines over it.  
  
At the thought Hanbin can nearly smell the homemade food and feel the love that would fill the air. He suddenly feels a tinge of sadness for his own home, the rare times he would contact his family because he never had to live terribly far away. He's taken such warmth for granted all these years.  
  
He wanders down the halls, squeezing past a few scattered boxes and objects Bobby has precariously set out. Hanbin stops when he gets to a small corner room. It's smaller than the rest of the bedrooms. A single window set in the wall has yet to catch the light from the sun, leaving the room in a cooling glow of early afternoon shade. There's a rolled up carpet standing at the far wall, Hanbin grazes it with his hand. The tape keeping it closed has markings and Hanbin recognizes it to be Bobby's handwriting.  _My room._  
  
"An existence beyond compare," Hanbin spins around spotting Bobby standing in the doorway watching him. The space starts to feel more intimate, Hanbin feels caught red handed but for what he doesn't know. His heart skitters despite himself.  
  
"Contradicting on all accounts," Bobby continues and Hanbin recognizes the lines just as the floor feels like it opens into a pit beneath him. "Hair as black as the starless night but a smile as bright as the cloudless day."  
  
Bobby smiles then, the brightest thing in the space. It rushes Hanbin's blood, his neck has started to prickle with heat and Hanbin swallows. The question what are you doing? rings in his mind but he doesn't speak. Not because he can't but because there's a tension radiating off of Bobby and Hanbin will wait for it to diffuse.  
  
"I wanted it to be me," Bobby whispers, he has stepped inside the space. A hand running along the wall, his stare elsewhere. "I was so focused on debuting, making money so I could bring my mom home that I didn't..."  
  
Bobby looks to Hanbin then. Hanbin picks up on the worry in Bobby's voice, "...realize your feelings. Or maybe I did...but—" Bobby's brow furrows and then he shakes his head.  
  
"I was greedy, I think." And then amends, "I know."  
  
Bobby lets that sink between them and Hanbin is close to asking Bobby to speak louder so Hanbin can hear this over his bottle rocket heart beats. But instead Hanbin let go a breath and continues his wait.  
  
"I wanted you along with everything else but even after I knew of your feelings, I still couldn't give you the attention." Bobby says this in a rush, "there it was my feelings reciprocated and I was foolish to force them from you early on. I kept thinking you'd get over me before I had the time to reply to them. I wanted to act but there was all this stress and I knew it'd be a mess if it wasn't _just_  right."  
  
Bobby takes a breath, flustered and bothered. He runs a hand through his hair and Hanbin reaches out. His fingers brush behind Bobby's elbow, the lightest touch but Bobby melts. Hanbin's heart races for entirely different reasons now.  
  
He brings his hand down until it's just the tips of their fingers that touch. It's hardly noticeable, that touch, but they're attached like magnets. When Hanbin brings his hand back Bobby follows until they step into each other's space.  
  
Bobby watches them and Hanbin watches Bobby's face. The tension builds into a shaky tower ready to topple.  
  
"Then Show Me The Money came," Bobby says after a bit of time. "I couldn't believe it."  
  
Bobby laughs then, a small choked sound that Hanbin smiles at. Their eyes meet.  
  
"I won that," Bobby says and a rush of pride fills them both. "And then we were told we'd be debuting. And it was all this work but it was finally paying off until the only thing that was missing was, you."  
  
Hanbin breaks out into a full grin. His hand comes to Bobby's jaw and he strokes it as if it was his first time touching those sharp lines. All the words he could have said are lost when his stare goes to Bobby's lips. His own are parting, and then Bobby is leaning into him.  
  
The tension breaks like a single firework set free just before more ignite into a fantastic explosion of so many feelings at once.  
  
It's slow, like they're both afraid the dream will break. They give time to savor it, there's a hand on the small of Hanbin's back and another cupping his neck. A fine tingle runs through his spine between the two points.  
  
Hanbin can't keep track of his own hands, at the press of lips he was holding Bobby's jaws but when he draws back and Bobby follows to recapture him, his hands have threaded through Bobby's hair. He isn't even sure if he's doing this right and maybe it's because of that lapse that Bobby manages to get a tongue into his mouth. Hanbin jolts and now he feels the material of Bobby's shirt in his grip. He would have jumped back but Bobby forbad it, eliciting a small whine from the depths of Hanbin's throat.  
  
Goosebumps break out across his skin when the tips of their tongues touch. The guest in his mouth sparking flares everywhere it touches. Hanbin's fist twists in Bobby's shirt and then his arms are wrapping around Bobby's neck. Dragging him down closer, for there's a lot that Hanbin is not, but a fast learner has always been one of his most profitable skills.  
  
And it pays off now with a smirk when he pushes back into Bobby's mouth. He's hesitant still but Hanbin's committed. He trails the roof of Bobby's mouth and the boy shudders against him. And then it's Bobby's tongue against his, guiding him as if on a tour to his favorite spots.  
  
They keep kissing until the giddiness and surrealness gets to be too much. On pause for breath Hanbin laughs honest and happy. Bobby smiles, soft and cute just before nuzzling into Hanbin's cheek.  
  
"It was worth the wait," Hanbin admits.  
  
"What was?"  
  
_"You."_

 

 

~

**Author's Note:**

> I too am surprised that I pulled through to actually finish something. I have the lovely beta Aby to thank for that. Find her on tumblr [Shimco](http://shimco.tumblr.com/)
> 
> Thanks for reading! This is also on livejournal under coquettish-rap. Also find me on tumblr under that same name~ 
> 
> Comments make me cry with happiness~


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